Nashville's Lambchop are the kind of band that likes to keep people guessing. When the motley collective (which boasts approximately 14 members at any one time) first burst into the indie-rock consciousness back in 1994 with I Hope Your Sitting Down, many had them pegged as wacked-out alt. country practitioners thanks to heavy doses of pedal steel and the group's ‘music city' lineage.

Seemingly on a mission to avoid the alt. country label ever since being tagged with it, subsequent releases found raspy throated singer/guitarist/songwriter Kurt Wagner and his revolving group of satellite musicians incorporating an increasingly lush and orchestral sound informed by Philly soul (they even went so far as to start covering Curtis Mayfield). The lushness apparently reached its peak with Nixon (2000) as the group's latest affair, Is a Woman, finds Lambchop taking on new territory by stripping away the layers and slowing things down a bit.

Is a Woman's eleven songs revolve primarily around the deft piano playing of new member Tony Crow and Wagner's droll lyricism (two parts silly, one part sad) which is pushed to the fore. Gone are the skewed brass laden soul tunes of the past few years and in its place is a collection of reflective late-night ballads. Wagner's caustic wit (the man once wrote a song called "My Face, Your Ass") is still present, however, and repeated listens reveal Lambchop to be as inventive a unit as ever, albeit in a more understated manner.

"To some extent I had a different kind of sound in my head going into the process that I knew we could probably make," explained Wagner. "It was basically tracked live with a core of about eight or nine of us. Several tracks have as many as 20 people playing on them though, which surprises people. It's funny because we wanted to make a quiet record but in order for people to really hear all of it and pick up the little details you kind of have to crank it up."

Wagner sounds audibly pleased by his new record's mischievous brand of depth, and he should be. The ‘less is more' approach of Is a Woman pays off repeatedly, songs like "The New Cobweb Summer" work off of skeletal piano and acoustic guitar arrangements while keyboard squiggles, vocal harmonies and brass bits dart in and out of the sublimely atmospheric mix. In the process of gutting their formerly lush sound Lambchop have mastered the more difficult art of manipulating open space.

Whenever bands undergo a dramatic change in sound critics are inclined to look for corresponding changes in the band members personal lives, some easy way to ‘explain' the shift in their art. Unsurprisingly, many critics have already been quick to attribute the somber and meditative tone of Is a Woman to Wagner's recent retirement from his day job of fifteen years as a carpenter. "I think to some extent a little bit more has been made of me quitting being a carpenter then is necessary," explained the 42-year-old Wagner. "I quit because I was physically unable to carry on doing that particular job, I didn't quit to become a rock star. My body just happened to wear out at the right time because I've been able to stay busy enough just with doing the music end of things right now. The only real impact my retirement had on the record was that I ended up being a lot more domestic around the house, and I always write from my life experience in some way, so that changed the tone a bit."

Wagner's time around the house has resulted in some truly downcast lyrical gems; his lyrical eye has never been sharper, consistently producing striking images while chronicling the disturbed characters in his songs. Wagner still employs the occasional expert dash of quirky humor to alleviate his melancholic stew though, "The depressive/humorous thing is just how songwriting happens for me," Wagner said. "It's just the way I am, I come around to seeing the humor in stuff in general. I'm not a really down guy, I don't see my songs as defining what I am or what I'm about. I don't think of life as all up or all down, and my songs reflect that. I don't think of myself as some depressive type. I'm a pretty normal guy."

Normal as Wagner may claim to be, his band is far from it. Is a Woman re-affirms Lambchop as a uniquely American treasure, albeit one that is largely appreciated more overseas. Despite having only a small stateside following, Lambchop (like seemingly every other lovably idiosyncratic American outfit) have found a sizable cult in Europe where they've played large headlining shows and appeared on British magazine covers along-side Ryan Adams.

"Over in England apparently they feel that me and Ryan Adams are somehow connected and that says it all really," said Wagner while stifling a laugh. "They just have a completely different way of looking at American music. They don't even use the same sort of yardstick. They just have a different way of assessing what bands do. I think as far as what we are in the U.S., I would be surprised if very many people even know who we are."

Wagner doesn't seem too troubled by his band's lower stateside profile, however, in keeping with his generally lax attitude about other people's perceptions of his art and their need to classify it. "I just don't think about being labeled alt. country or those kind of things at all, those are just issues absolutely outside of my concern," said Wagner. "People can call it moonshine monk music for all I care. I understand that people feel the need to articulate and describe things that are hard to articulate. I mean what does music sound like? That's hard to articulate. People are going to think what they think about your music regardless of labels. They could call it bad music if they want to, hopefully they call it good music."

Mission accomplished, Mr. Wagner.